TechSF job-training results questioned

Some supervisors question results

Updated 5:56 am, Friday, April 26, 2013

Rone Bowles (left), Tikiya Hassan and Carl Craig - with Year Up - have internships with companies outside the program.

Rone Bowles (left), Tikiya Hassan and Carl Craig - with Year Up - have internships with companies outside the program.

Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle

Image 2 of 4

Cameron Tang, 19, is a student at the nonprofit Year Up training program in San Francisco, which is working with TechSF.

Cameron Tang, 19, is a student at the nonprofit Year Up training program in San Francisco, which is working with TechSF.

Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle

Image 3 of 4

Lou Alvin Cayabyab and Devante Tillis, (right) listen to fellow students sharing their ideas at the year up training program in downtown San Francisco, Calif. on Wednesday April 24, 2013. They are currently enrolled in internship programs with local companies, Cayabyab with Twitter and Tillis with salesforce. The city run program is designed to train local workers for technology jobs.

Lou Alvin Cayabyab and Devante Tillis, (right) listen to fellow students sharing their ideas at the year up training program in downtown San Francisco, Calif. on Wednesday April 24, 2013. They are currently

Ceddrick Jonae had a seemingly solid career as a video postproduction technician until he was laid off from his job at Current TV in late 2010.

After being unemployed for about two years, the 46-year-old resident of San Francisco's Civic Center area now has a new job thanks, in part, to a city training program designed to help recent local graduates and mid-career professionals join in the technology boom.

Mayor Ed Lee's administration counts Jonae among the success stories in its fledgling effort to create a pipeline for San Franciscans to get lucrative new-economy jobs, but several members of the Board of Supervisors question whether tax breaks showered on the tech industry since Lee took office in 2011 are paying off for residents as a whole.

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Since Lee's TechSF job training program opened in the fall, 150 people - the vast majority of them San Franciscans - have enrolled, according to the city's Office of Economic and Workforce Development. Of those, 26 have gotten jobs at companies like Google or Academy of Art University, where Jonae was recently hired as a video lab technician after getting software training.

All but three of the hires were city residents. Federal grant rules prohibit San Francisco from limiting the program only to city residents.

Another 22 San Franciscans have gotten internships through the program at places like nonprofit software developer Mozilla and Kaiser Permanente, according to Lee's administration.

Supervisor David Campos, who sees the influx of young tech workers driving up rents in the Mission District he represents, called those figures "sad," "striking" and a "wake-up call that we need to do more."

"I think this industry is actually doing very little for creating job opportunities for young people, especially the (disadvantaged) populations we're talking about," Campos said Thursday at a City Hall hearing looking into the effectiveness of the program. "You have companies that overnight are creating billionaires, but it doesn't really seem like the results are there."

City tax breaks

City tax breaks that have benefited tech companies, including an exemption for stock options and the business tax on new hires for companies like Twitter that expand in the Mid-Market area, were pitched as a way to improve job prospects for all San Franciscans, including disadvantage youth.

Supervisors Jane Kim and London Breed, who requested the hearing, repeatedly stressed that they expected better efforts to notify underprivileged residents about the training program.

Lee, who relentlessly pounded his jobs creation message during the 2011 campaign, said he's pleased with the results so far, which come as the overall unemployment rate in the city dropped to 6 percent in April, the third lowest in the state and a 3.5 percentage point drop since Lee took office.

"We think we've got the makings of a great foundation," Lee said late Wednesday.

The percentage of women, Latinos, African Americans, Asians and Pacific Islanders enrolled in the training program are all higher than the rate at which those groups are employed nationally in the tech sector, according to the city's economic development office.

The highest neighborhood concentration of participants in the program are from the Excelsior, city data show, but only half that number are from South of Market, home to many tech companies, or the neighboring, downtrodden Tenderloin. Three people taking the training are listed in city records as homeless.

42,000 new jobs

Growth in the tech industry is projected to create more than 42,000 new jobs in San Francisco, Marin and San Mateo counties by 2020, according to state projections, and Lee said those positions will have direct and indirect benefits for lower-income residents or those who initially lack skills to compete for them.

In the short term, he pointed to a Bay Area Council Economic Institute report from December that found that for every high-tech job created, another 4.3 jobs are added in other areas, like lawyers, shuttle bus drivers and coffee shop baristas.

And once his TechSF training program has a chance to grow, even more people will have a chance to gain skills, Lee said.

Supervisors "might get frustrated with the pace, but I started out pounding mortar off of bricks when I was in high school," said Lee, who spent some time living in public housing in Seattle. "No one told me I could be the mayor of San Francisco. I don't think it's going to take someone 40 years, but I also think there has to be an effort both ways."

The durability of TechSF is another question, though. The city's portion is funded by two federal grants totaling $5.4 million.

TechSF's job placement rate is also lagging behind Lee's stated goal of using the program to put 2,500 residents from diverse backgrounds in tech jobs over the next five years.

"It's important to note that we are just seven months into a five-year program," said Todd Rufo, head of the Office of Economic and Workforce Development, who pointed to a stream of TechSF students who told supervisors how the training had improved their job prospects, self-esteem and quality of life.

"They are the inspiration and motivation for this program," Rufo said.

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